Hymnals

Concordia Publishing House has a promotion going on entitled Hymnal in every Home.  The idea is to place a hymnal in every Lutheran's home as a resource for family devotions and teaching.

I applaud CPH for making the effort.  Every home should have a hymnal that is used regularly.  Throughout history, men of God were noted for always having a Bible and hymnal as their regular reading and teaching material.  They took seriously the following passages from Paul.

Ephesians 5:18-21 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Colossians 3:16-17 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.  And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

The need to use music for teaching was clear to the early church as noted in the following excerpts.  First from Clement of Alexandria:

In the present instance He is a guest with us. For the apostle adds again, “Teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, in psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your heart to God.”  And again, “Whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and His Father.”  This is our thankful revelry.  And even if you wish to sing and play to the harp or lyre, there is no blame.  Thou shalt imitate the righteous Hebrew king in his thanksgiving to God.  “Rejoice in the Lord, ye righteous; praise is comely to the upright,” says the prophecy.  “Confess to the Lord on the harp; play to Him on the psaltery of ten strings. Sing to Him a new song.”  And does not the ten-stringed psaltery indicate the Word Jesus, who is manifested by the element of the decad?  And as it is befitting, before partaking of food, that we should bless the Creator of all; so also in drinking it is suitable to praise Him on partaking of His creatures.  For the psalm is a melodious and sober blessing.  The apostle calls the psalm “a spiritual song.”

The Instructor, Book II, cap. 4.

Then another from Tertullian in relation to godly marriage:

Where the flesh is one, one is the spirit too.  Together they pray, together prostrate themselves, together perform their fasts; mutually teaching, mutually exhorting, mutually sustaining.  Equally (are they) both (found) in the Church of God; equally at the banquet of God; equally in straits, in persecutions, in refreshments.…Between the two echo psalms and hymns; and they mutually challenge each other which shall better chant to their Lord.  Such things when Christ sees and hears, He joys.  To these He sends His own peace. Where two (are), there withal (is) He Himself.  Where He (is), there the Evil One is not.

To His Wife, Book II

Lastly, I recommend this homily by John Chrysostom on Colossians 3:16-17.

I have hymnals of various denominations in my house—Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, Plymouth Brethren to name some.  There are hymns used by all of Protestantism, while others are unique to a particular group.  Christian hymnody is broad and rich.  Local churches would do well to investigate the breadth and depth of what has been given to the church universal and make it their own.